Dana M. Christian holds a Master of Business Administration degree with a management focus and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Mathematics. Dana began her career in the corporate world of a fortune 500 corporation, EDS, but soon realized that she could affect change in her community by dedicating her career to neighborhood redevelopment.

In 1996, she accepted an opportunity at NorthStar Community Development Corporation, (formerly REACH, Inc.) to restructure a failing community service program. Her success in that effort grew into her responsibility of developing and operating many community service programs spanning the areas of employment training, job development and youth activities. Her skills and talents quickly propelled her to senior management with a new focus on community based real estate development.

As a well-respected community development practitioner in the Detroit area, her most noted accomplishments are in the area of affordable housing development. Her introductory experiences as a housing developer resulted in the production of 148 units of now construction housing for the communities that she served. Using various affordable housing tools such as the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program, HOME and others, she has been responsible for every aspect in the creation of affordable housing such as concept design, land acquisition, financial packaging and asset management.

Being considered a high producer of nonprofit housing developments, she was asked to design and implement a training program for new organizations interested in the creation of affordable housing. Her training was implemented through the Michigan Neighborhood Partnership and served over 150 faith and community based organizations throughout the State of Michigan. Her training program, which included leadership and management skills develop modules, continues to be a vehicle for the creation of affordable housing through her development consulting services to nonprofit housing corporations.

To broaden the array of affordable housing skills that she possesses, Dana shifted her affordable housing focus to transforming dilapidated public housing into attractive, mixed income, mixed financed and mixed type communities though the HUD sponsored HOPE VI program. She was honored to be invited to join the national program management team for the redevelopment of the former Jeffries projects that had long been one of the most undesirable housing sits of the city. Her role as the local, day-to-day project manager thrusts her into every detail involved in the development of the new community. Include her most recent participation in the widely anticipated Far Eastside Redevelopment Project in Detroit, and these experiences have provided Dana with a solid foundation in real estate development that involves all types of housing; rental, for sale, senior, affordable, market rate, single family, and multi family.